History of the building of the
Semmering-Railway, 1848-1854
The Semmering-Railway held the worldwide highest
attainable place for public railways until 1860 (max.
altitude in 898 m above sea-level). First in the history
of railway a technical sophisticated railway-route was
buildt across an alpine pass.

Canada

Mount Royal Tunnel
At the beginning of this century, the company acquired a
train service network between Quebec City and Hawkesbury.
In 1912, in order to reduce travel time between the two
cities, Canadian Northern drilled a 5.2 km tunnel through
the volcanic rock of Mount Royal. Exploring the Mount-Royal Tunnel ventilation
shaft
Article with pictures from the tunnelIn 1913 construction started on the longest
railway tunnel in Canada. When
completed it eliminated 16 kilometres of some of the most
hazardous railway line in the world. Operation of the
eight-kilometer Connaught Tunnel commended on December
13, 1916. Rogers Pass was abandoned.

Canada - USA

The first St. Clair Tunnel was opened in 1891. One hundred years later it remains an
engineering wonder. Running under the St. Clair River,
which joins Lake Huron to Lake St. Clair, the single bore
tunnel provided a link between Sarnia, Ontario, Canada
and Port Huron, Michigan, USA.

Denmark

Storebælt (The Great Belt fixed link), 1997
The three crossings being built straddle an 18 km-wide
waterway, and their drastic effect on the region's
communications is illustrated by the fact that a crossing
which formerly had to be undertaken by water, and took
one hour, can now be achieved in just seven minutes.

England

The Box Tunnel, 1841
Box tunnel was started in 1836 and took round about five
years to be built. It is a railway tunnel that goes under
the hill between Box and Corsham. At 2939 metres, it was
the longest tunnel in the world at that time. It was so
long that some people were too scared to go through it,
so they had to be transported over the hill by carriage.

The Lesseux - Sainte Marie line, 1937
The Lesseux - Sainte-Marie link passes through a base
tunnel which is 6874 m long and therefore was the longest
tunnel entirely situated on French territory. The
Lesseux-Sainte Marie line was opened in 1937, allowing
for Nancy-Colmar direct trains.

Japan

The Seikan Tunnel, Tsugaru Strait, 1988
The Seikan Tunnel is the world's longest submarine
tunnel, involving excavation 100 meters below the seabed
across a strait where the sea is up to 140 meters in
depth. Plans, length profile..
Public outcry after a 1954 typhoon sank five ferry boats
and killed 1,430 people in the Tsugaru Strait led the
Japanese government to search for a safer way to make the
crossing. Work on the Seikan began in 1964.
Shimizu tunnel, 1982
The Joetsu Shinkansen was laid to link the Pacific with
the Japan Sea sides of Honshu, the main island of Japan,
across the mid part of the island. Construction was
started in December 1971 and completed in 1982, with
bullet trains covering the distance between Omiya and
Niigata (303.6 km) in one hour and 45 minutes. The
Shimizu Tunnel, linking Niigata and Gunma prefectures, is
the world's longest mountain tunnel, boasting a length of
22.3 km.

The Norwegian Railway Network
The longest tunnels:
1. Romeriksporten, Gardermo line (Oslo - Lørenskog): 13
900 meters, opened 1998
2. Lieråsen, Drammen line (Asker - Lier): 10 723 meters,
opened 1973
3. Finse, Bergen line: 10 300 meters, opened 1993
4. Kvineshei, Sørland line: 9 065 meters, opened 1943
5. Hægebostad, Sørland line: 8 474 meters, opened 1943
The Flåm Line (20 tunnels), 1941
This line is just a master piece of engineering. The
train journey from Myrdal to Flåm is a railway
experience unparalleled in Europe; 20 km long with a
descent of 865 m, 20 tunnels with a total length of
almost 6000 m and a gradient of one to 18. To cope with
the enormous change in height over such a short stretch,
the line runs partly through tunnels which spiral in and
out of the mountainside. The gradient is quite
exceptional for an ordinary normal-gauge railway not
using cog wheels.

Russia

The Trans-Siberian Railway
The longest tunnel on the Transsib: under Amur, is
parallel to the bridge (about 6 km). The longest tunnel
on a main route of the Transsib - Tarmanchukan tunnel,
near Arkhara station (about 3 km).

Switzerland

The Simplon Tunnel - Greatest Tunnel in the
World, 1905
Modern History Sourcebook:
Francis Fox: How the Swiss Built the Greatest Tunnel in
the World, 1905
There was no question that a tunnel through the Simplon
would be a great advantage; but could it be made? Rhätische Bahn
Topics: Rhaetian Railway Network Rolling Stock History
and Operations Photographic Reports Miscellaneous
Information about the RhBInformation about Swiss narrow gauge railways
Switzerland's rail network is one of the world's most
densely concentrated rail systems. Due to the extremely
mountainous terrain, railway engineers opted for the more
economical narrow gauge construction; the distance
between the rails is less than the standard 1435 mm.
Because of this large variety of design and purpose,
detailed descriptions of many of them will be found on
this website.

USA

The
Hoosac Tunnel, on the Boston & Maine RR, 1874
The Hoosac Tunnel lies in Northwestern Massachusetts, and
runs 4.82 miles under the Berkshire Mountain range. It is
one of the great engineering feats of the 19th century,
and took 22 years to complete.The Cascade Tunnel, Great Northern Railway, 1929
One of the most amazing engineering feats of the 1920's
was carried out on the system of the Great Northern
Railway of America when a new tunnel was driven through
the giant Cascade range from Scenic to Berne. Just on
eight miles were completed within three years.
The westbound Oriental Limited was GN's first train to
pass through its completed Cascade Tunnel, on January 12,
1929. A tunnel 7.79 miles long in the Cascade mountain
range of Washington, was at that time it was built this
hemisphere's longest bore. The Great Northern built it
between 1925 and 1929 to replace a shorter, less
efficient tunnel at a higher altitude, just outside which
a snow slide had hurled a passenger train and other
railroad property into a ravine, killing at least 101
people. The Chicago Tunnel Company Railroad Home Page
This website tells the story about a 60-mile, two-foot
gauge electric railroad that operated 149 locomotives and
over 3000 freight cars in small tunnels forty feet below
the streets of downtown Chicago.The
BART's tunnels and tubes
San Francisco was very congested. They needed a different
mode of transportation to get people in there and BART,
more specifically the tube, was its salvation.
Construction began in 1965 with plans to build 57
sections of tube shells measuring nearly 48 feet wide, 24
feet high and about 330 feet long.Anton Anderson Memorial Tunnel - Whittier
Tunnel, June 7, 2000
The Anton Anderson Memorial Tunnel is located on the
Portage Glacier Highway, and this highway connects the
city of Whittier and Prince William Sound to the Seward
Highway and the rest of Southcentral Alaska. The Anton
Anderson Memorial Tunnel is a landmark effort that boasts
several "firsts": The longest highway tunnel in
North America. The longest combined rail-highway use
tunnel in North America.....
A unique tunnel design transforms a 1940s-era railroad
tunnel into a 21st-century road and railroad tunnel. For
the first time this summer, automobiles and trains will
be able to travel through the Anton Anderson Memorial
Tunnel to Whittier. Thanks to a unique design, the tunnel
will allow a single lane of automobile traffic to drive
directly over the railroad track - a design that saved
tens of millions of dollars over the cost of constructing
a new tunnel for vehicles. The History of the Transcontinental Railroad
Historic articles about the First Transcontinental
Railway. Information about trains and historic maps